A brief look at the stories making headlines in the Russian-language press

A Russian soccer player has won backing for his right to play in European Union countries in a ruling that could open up EU leagues to even more foreigners.

Palestinian militants resumed rocket and mortar fire at Jewish settlements in Gaza on Tuesday, throwing down the gauntlet to newly elected Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas and his call for calm to talk peace with Israel.

Prosecutors unveiled new graphic photographs and videos from Abu Ghraib prison as they tried to portray the soldier accused as the ringleader of the abuse scandal there as a sadistic thug who punched detainees for sport, posed smiling next to the bloody face of a detainee and bragged about forcing an Iraqi woman to let him photograph her naked.

U.S. President George W. Bush on Tuesday nominated U.S. Appeals Court Judge Michael Chertoff, an architect of the Justice Department's anti-terror response after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, to become secretary of homeland security.

Until two weeks ago, Smith Thammasaroj was a prophet without honor. As chief of Thailand's meteorological department in 1998, he was accused of scaremongering when he warned that the country's southwestern coast could face a deadly tsunami.